


promises

by novakid



Category: Vampyr (Video Game)
Genre: Evil Reid route, Fluff and Angst, Geoffrey is a mess., Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mentions of Suicide, Sean is patient., Vampire Geoffrey McCullum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-13
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-05-02 10:50:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,280
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19197295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/novakid/pseuds/novakid
Summary: After Jonathan Reid leaves London in shambles, Geoffrey McCullum agrees to help Sean Hampton rebuild their broken city. Despite a budding friendship, Geoffrey lashes out and distances himself from the only person who truly understood him... But with his maker's ever constant voice tempting him to take human life to survive, the only comfort Geoffrey can think to find is one Sad Saint. They have a conversation.





	promises

When Geoffrey wakes up, his body is paralyzed and he feels something dark and sickly gnawing into the corners of his mind.

His muscles are taut, his limbs are frozen, his chest constricted, and he feels so, so, so lost. Like he’s somewhere unknown to him, sky downcast and air covered in a thick fog he can hardly breathe in. He can’t turn his head, but in the corners of his eyes, he can see that it’s sundown. He can see that he is alone in his room. That fills him with some ease, but not much.

Geoffrey lies awake and waits until he regains movement; first in his fingers, then up his arms. Soon, he is able to prop himself up on his elbows.

He hasn’t had a night as bad as this one in weeks. Despite the fact that they’ve been growing less frequent, Geoffrey still worries-- will he get complacent the more time stretches between the bad nights where darkness calls out to him? His Priwen boys always gossip about how  _ paranoid _ he can get, but they don’t know and wouldn’t understand the horrors he’s been dealing with since the epidemic. Since he turned.

Since Dr. Jonathan Reid stormed into his life, wiped out nearly half of London, and disappeared.

They’re awful. The nightmares he’s been having of his maker are all awful. Fighting him, or joining him, or hurting people because of him. Geoffrey hasn’t used much of his vampiric abilities; not the blood magic or mind control. He’s moved through the shadows as mist before, but only in the most dire of situations. He’s afraid, as silly as it is, that he may be tempted with power.

**_And there’s only one way for a vampire to become more powerful. You know what that is, don’t you McCullum?_ **

He loses sleep every time he hears  _ that _ voice in his head.

There isn’t anyone he can talk to about this. Not anyone in the Guard. Not Swansea. There aren’t many folk that share his affliction that he hasn’t deemed a menace or a monster, except…

Geoffrey nervously gnaws at his knuckles as he debates heading to the East end docks. He remembers when he frequented the East end often, when the epidemic finally died down and Reid supposedly disappeared. Geoffrey chastised himself for not going after him-- at the time, he was concerned with hunting Reid to the ends of the Earth. He didn’t care if he would keep running, because Geoffrey was willing to chase him down for as long as he needed to. But the sorry state of London always held him back, and he knew that someone strong needed to stay behind and help rebuild while the remaining living healed.

Geoffrey did what he could to fight off any remaining beasts lurking in the streets at night, but he was no healer. Just a soldier with a big sword and crossbow; he could not mend any wounds or console any broken hearts. That, he left to one Sad Saint of the East end. Were it any other Skal, Geoffrey would sooner skewer the thing in front of his men and make an example of it...

But Sean Hampton was different. He was kind and soft, didn’t crave blood and spoke delicately and with purpose, unlike any Skal Geoffrey’s ever met. Unlike any _ man _ he’s ever met. He remembers the night Sean Hampton approached him, a few days after Reid disappeared. He was well over a half foot shorter than Geoffrey, and brought no weapon with him, but Sean did not quake in his boots, nor did his voice shake. He addressed him as “Mr. McCullum” and “sir” and politely asked him to help fix London in the awful wake Reid left. The man had not sired Sean, but adopted him as his progeny anyway, and bound him with his blood. Sean said he felt responsible somehow because of this. As Reid’s true progeny, Geoffrey could somewhat empathize with this. The doctor left many messes, the two men included, so they saw it fit to try to clean up the rest.

It was nice company for awhile. It was odd, but with Geoffrey killing beasts and saving citizens, and Sean healing and taking care of them… they worked well together in the rebuilding of London. Geoffrey found peace in a quiet friendship they developed. Soon after, Sean confided in Geoffrey and told him of when Reid forced him to drink his blood by weaponizing his past trauma, and in turn Geoffrey confessed about the worst night of his life, the turning… and reluctantly, the voice of his maker ringing through his dreams. But it was okay, because as ironic as it was, Geoffrey trusted this one Skal who treated him like a man instead of a thug, or a monster.

And Geoffrey had to go and ruin all of that, too.

Today, after he struggles to climb out of bed following his nightmare, he stands in front of the shelter. He knocks on the door, but after a moment of waiting, Geoffrey is ready to turn around and go back home. That’s when the door opens.

Sean looks exhausted. It’s hard to stand the sight of it, and it’s harder to see his brows furrowed in… confusion, displeasure, disgust, it doesn’t matter because it’s obviously not a  _ great  _ reaction.

“Mr. McCullum. What brings you here this early in the night?” It’s too formal. Geoffrey feels as if he may break in hives over the deliberate distance Sean is keeping between them.

“I, ah.” He stammers, and curses himself for it. “I wanted to check up on you.” Which is a lie, of course, but Geoffrey realizes that coming all this way, after all this time to be comforted despite not apologizing for their fallout would be very selfish and  _ stupid _ of him.

Sean, of course, knows that he’s lying right away. Though, he doesn’t falter, because accusing him of lying would be rude, and despite the rift Geoffrey tore between them, Sean would never close his doors to anyone. 

Geoffrey wishes he would make an exception this one time, though.

“That’s very kind of you, and I’m happy to tell you that everyone here is doing fine. I haven’t had any of your men in here for quite some time, which I assume is good news for the streets of London.”

Geoffrey nods thoughtfully in response, and when he doesn’t wrap the conversation up, Sean gets the idea and opens the door wider for him to come in. As honest as the Sad Saint tries to be, he is an impeccable actor. Any other person who doesn’t know Sean as intimately as Geoffrey does could see that the Skal is dreading the visit already.

Sean brings him to the dining room, a quiet and empty alcove from the rest of the shelter and its sleeping inhabitants. “How have you been faring, Mr. McCullum?” Which is Sean speak for  _ ‘Let's get right to the point: What do you want?’ _

Geoffrey sits beside Sean, but gives him space. It takes a lot of courage to speak up; he’s never felt so nervous.

“I haven’t been well, to be frank with you.”

That seems to be no surprise to Sean, who only nods. “What seems to be ailing you, friend?”

Bad dreams. Awful regrets. Fear of failure, fear of being discovered. He could go on for hours, but he starts with, “I’ve been hearing Reid’s voice in my head again. I don’t know whether it’s really him, or if… If I’m just having these paranoid delusions.” Sean is silent for a moment, looking quizzical, like he’s looking for something to say, but Geoffrey can’t handle the silence. He can’t handle looking at Sean as he lets his mouth run off, either. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t think there’s anything I  _ can _ do. Anything  _ anyone _ can do. You don’t have to give me advice, or a solution to a problem I’ll always have, I just…”

“Need someone to listen.” Sean says. Geoffrey looks up at him again and nods.

“I… Am in need of your tranquility. I know things have been tense between us these past few weeks-- It’s my fault, I know this. The things I said to you… I was stupid. For if it were not for your guiding hand, I would have…” Geoffrey trails off, unable to finish that thought. Still, Sean waits for Geoffrey to finish. The tell of a good listener, Geoffrey thinks, is staying the fuck quiet and letting the other person nervously yammer on about nearly everything and anything. Sean must know that quite well by now, after all these years. He sighs softly and shakes his head. “What I’m trying to say is… I’m sorry, Sean. You have only ever been kind to me and I... Misplaced your trust and faith in me. I shouldn’t have come here and disturbed you.”

Geoffrey gets up to leave, but stops when he feels a firm grasp of Sean’s hand around his wrist. He sits back down, and looks at Sean with wide eyes, like a child whose hand was caught in a candy jar.

Sean is smiling, and he has this soft, sad expression on his face. And his eyes… Those bright eyes… It hurts to look at them. He feels guilty when he does. “I forgive you, Geoffrey. Although I have to correct you… I never lost faith in you.” Sean lets go of Geoffrey’s wrist, and instead takes hold of his large hand with both of his own scarred, bandaged hands. “You’re a good man.”

“No-- Not a good man…  _ Hell. _ I’m barely a man.”

“I hope you aren’t implying you’re a monster.”

“Am I not?”

“No.” Sean looks up at Geoffrey, determined. He tries to find an ounce of dishonesty, but Sean is so sincere… Trying to find a faulty conviction in Sean is like trying to find a needle in a haystack. “You do good. You help people. Save people.”

“I was bad to you. I hurt you.”

“You were angry.”

“You were, too.”

Sean pauses, a bit startled. But he doesn’t deny that. Of course he doesn’t. Geoffrey still remembers the night they had their fight. Where Geoffrey had his fight; it was one sided and Sean didn’t dare try to retaliate. That had only made McCullum angrier, which made him lash out even more, until Sean finally told him to leave his shelter. Geoffrey tries not to remember, because the things he said to this day still make his stomach turn.

It looks as if Sean is going through the same thought process, remembering that awful night. He picks his words carefully, “We don’t always say what we mean when we’re very angry, or even when we’re overjoyed. We get overwhelmed with emotion…”

“But I--”

“But you apologized. And I’m grateful you did.”

The palm in Sean’s hands turns to face up, and it unclenches when Geoffrey realizes it's been in a fist. “I still hurt you. And you didn’t deserve that.”

“I’ve been hurt before.” Sean says solemnly, and Geoffrey knows how brutally true that is. “People look at me as if I’m weak. Like I’m made of glass; fragile. As if I haven’t been fighting since the day I was born.” Perhaps there was even bitterness between Sean’s lips as he says that. “What you said that night… I’ll recover. I’ve been dealt with worse hands.”

“That’s still not fair to you.”

“Wounds heal, Geoffrey.”

“Sometimes they scar.” Geoffrey pauses and sighs, cursing quietly at himself again. “I’m sorry. I need to be better. I need to start being better.”

“If I know anything,” Sean says knowingly, “It’s that you are way too hard on yourself.”

“It’s true, though!” He raises his voice and suddenly stands up, pulling his hands away from the Saint. “And maybe I’m not hard enough! I use to kill leeches without question. And what with Reid yelling in my ear about blood, my power, my  _ destiny _ … How will I end up? Like him? A bloodthirsty maniac who ruins everything he touches? Killing  _ humans _ without question?!”

“I- That’s not--” Sean stands up too and follows Geoffrey, trying to calm him. “You’re not like him. You may never be like him.”

“And how can you be so sure?” Hot anger rises to his face, and his blood beats loud like drums in his ears. “How can you be so sure I won’t hurt someone? It’d be so easy, too! After all, I’ve already hurt you!”

“Geoffrey…”

“You don’t know anything about me,  _ Skal! _ ” Geoffrey pulls away from Sean, who doesn’t follow. He’s angry, so angry he can barely see. Perhaps his tears have something to do with it, and  _ fuck Sean _ for making him cry and being there to see it.

**_Anger makes it all easier, doesn’t it?_ **

McCullum startles as he chokes on a sob and covers his mouth. He looks back down at Sean, who has the same hurt expression he had a few weeks ago during that fight. But his face immediately softens when their eyes meet again. His face says “I understand”, and  _ that’s _ frustrating. 

Geoffrey hangs his head, defeated. “I am sorry. Again.” He murmurs quietly. “I am so tired, I can’t sleep. I am so, so afraid.”

Sean presses his lips in a tight line and nods. “You have a lot to lose.”

“More like London does. If I go mad, or if I kill myself trying to prevent that. Either way, I’m worthless.” 

“Don’t speak like that… You’re not worthless.”

Geoffrey rolls his eyes. “Because all life is precious, and God loves everyone, right?”

“Something like that.” Sean’s delivery is quick and playful. Geoffrey always liked that about Sean. He can’t help but smile as he wipes the tears from his face. “I’ll say it again until you believe me…  _ You’re a good man. _ And you don’t deserve to suffer, not even by your own hand.”

“Ha, sure. Guilt is the province of living, Sean Hampton. I must, because if I don’t keep myself in check, what will I become? More of a monster than I already was? I  _ have _ to be hard on myself. For what am I, if not a protector of the innocent?”

“You are a  _ person _ .”

They stand there, inches apart, silent and still like a graveyard. It has been the first time since that was addressed since his turning: despite what he is now, what they  _ both _ are now, they are still as human as the day they were born, fangs or no.

After everything, Geoffrey has forgotten that.

Sean takes one step closer, until there is only an inch between them. He takes both of Geoffrey’s hands, one in each of his, and looks up at him. And his eyes? They’re searing. “You can strive for improvement, Geoffrey.” His words are tender, and the hunter feels like falling into them. “But you can not forget that you are still a person. You can’t strive for perfection, or ask too much of yourself. The fact that you’re already regretting the things you’ve yet to do is telling. You care…  _ so much _ . I had faith in you when we were at odds with one another, and I have faith in you now, and I bet I’ll have faith in you in the future, whatever path you’ll take.”

“And if having that much faith in me makes you a fool?”

“Then call me a fool.”

Finally, Geoffrey reciprocates and returns the tender grip in Sean’s hands, each holding onto one another. They stand in a comfortable silence, Geoffrey hearing nothing but the steady, calm beat of Sean’s undead heart. There’s something fluttering in his own chest he can’t quite place.

“We have time, Geoffrey. Time to make mistakes. Time to get better.”

“It’s still frightening.” McCullum swallows hard, holding onto Sean’s hands like a lifeline. “To think, I have an eternity to live with his voice in my head… To live knowing I could hurt people. Or that I have already hurt people whose only crime was their cursed blood.”

“You’re strong. I have no doubt you won’t let Reid get to you.”

“You’re strong too.” More than Geoffrey has ever been. 

Sean smiles, and nods. His voice drops to a gentle whisper. “If you think so, then I will help you. My strength will be yours.”

“And mine, yours…” He pauses, and feels a flush on his face he hopes his affliction will hide. “If you’ll have me.”

“I will.”

“I’m still scared.”

“It’s okay. I’m here, I’ll be here.”

There is nothing scarier than uncertainty, of course. But the promise of Sean’s presence made the future an easier pill to swallow. The two stand together, bodies nearly pressed together, and hands clasped tightly in hands. The moonlight over Geoffrey’s shoulder lights up Sean’s face, blemishes and all, as well as softening the shadows stray candles in the room made on his face. It is almost ethereal, Geoffrey thinks. And his eyes…

Looking into Sean’s golden eyes is not unlike looking into the sky and seeing the sun. Geoffrey may never be able to step out in daylight for the rest of eternity, but in that moment… He doesn’t mind, so long as he can keep those eyes in his life.

Voice small, Geoffrey says, “I don’t want to hurt you. Ever again.”

“I trust you.”

“I don’t want to ask too much of you.”

“May I ask something of you, then?”

His lips are cold and dry now, Geoffrey can only nod.

“Can you--” Sean closes his mouth, and opens it again, trying different words each time, “Do you- I mean, would you--”

Geoffrey pulls one hand away from Sean’s and places it on the back of his neck, cradling it carefully. His other hand comes up to Sean’s chin, tilting it back ever so slightly. Their foreheads touch, and suddenly the space between them are gone. 

Sean smells of aged books and tastes of softness and winter. They hold each other there for an eternity, and seconds later when the kiss is over, Geoffrey realizes what the fluttering in his chest was.

“Thank you. For that.”

Sean smiles, face red. He shakes his head, clearly embarrassed, and averts his gaze. “For the kiss?”

For allowing Geoffrey back into his asylum. For talking to him, for listening. For being so understanding, for holding him and kissing him. For reminding him of what he’s been fighting for. 

“For everything.” 

It’s not Geoffrey’s most graceful answer, but it does the trick. Sean is smiling, like he knows just what Geoffrey meant. “You’re welcome. I… Thank you too.” Still holding Geoffrey, Sean leans in and closes his eyes. “Are you busy?”

“I hadn’t made any plans for the night, no.”

“Then, will you stay?”

Geoffrey sniffs and smiles, threading his fingers through the ends of Sean’s hair. “As long as you’ll have me.”

“I’ll have you. As long as I’m here.” Geoffrey wants to ask,  _ are you sure? _ , but as if reading his mind, Sean gets on his toes to reach and kiss him again. Soft, quick, sweet. “I promise.”

It’s as if Sean took his breath away. Geoffrey can only nod and say, “Then I’ll stay.” Taking Sean’s hands again, and holding his gaze. “I promise.”

They kiss again, and Geoffrey revels in the warmth he hasn’t felt as a vampire or human in a long time. And he is still scared of Reid, his affliction, his immortality, and whatever else is to come… But for once, with Sean’s faith ringing in his heart, Geoffrey believes he’ll be okay.

**Author's Note:**

> i've been trying to finish this for the longest time, i'm glad it wasn't lost in the void. i am... absolutely obsessed with these two. i wish they had gotten more development in the game, especially sean, because... i love them so much.  
> i find the evil!reid route very interesting, especially wrt the aftermath. someone has to clean up his mess... who else but two people he's hurt most?  
> once again, i beta everything myself so sorry if there's mistakes, lmk and i'll fix!
> 
> inspiration for a lot of this fic and the title: [right here!](https://youtu.be/kA1wixXHKow)


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